Munn v. Illinois, (1877), case in which the U.S.
Supreme Court upheld
the power of government to regulate private industries.
The case developed as a result of the Illinois legislatures responding in
1871 to pressure from the National Grange, an association of farmers,
by setting maximum rates that private companies could charge for the
storage and transport of agricultural products. The Chicago grain
warehouse firm of Munn and Scott was subsequently found guilty of
violating the law but appealed the conviction on the grounds that the
Illinois regulation represented an unconstitutional deprivation of property
without due process of law.
The Supreme Court heard the appeal in 1877. Chief Justice Morrison
Remick Waite spoke for the majority when he said that state power to
regulate extends to private industries that affect the public interest.
Because grain storage facilities were devoted to public use, their rates
were subject to public regulation. Moreover, Waite declared that even
though Congress alone is granted control over interstate commerce, a
state could take action in the public interest without impairing that
federal control.
Munn v. Illinois, one of the Granger cases (see Granger movement), was a
watershed in the struggle for public regulation of private enterprise.
Later court decisions, however, sharply curtailed the governments
power to regulate business.
Syllabus
1. Under the powers inherent in every sovereignty, a
government may regulate the conduct of its citizens toward
each other, and, when necessary for the public good, the
manner in which each shall use his own property.
2. It has, in the exercise of these powers, been customary in
England from time immemorial, and in this country from its
first colonization, to regulate ferries, common carriers,
hackmen, bakers, millers, wharfingers, innkeepers, &c., and,
in so doing, to fix a maximum of charge to be made for
services rendered, accommodations furnished, and articles
sold.
3. Down to the time of the adoption of the fourteenth
amendment of the Constitution of the United States, it was
not supposed that statutes regulating the use, or even the
price of the use, of private property necessarily deprived an
owner of his property without due process of law. Under
some circumstances, they may, but not under all. The
amendment does not change the law in this particular; it
simply prevents the States from doing that which will operate
as such deprivation.
4. When the owner of property devotes it to a use in which
the public has an interest, he in effect grants to the public an
interest in such use, and must, to the extent of that interest,
submit to be controlled by the public, for the common good,
as long as he maintains the use. He may withdraw his grant
by discontinuing the use.
5. Rights of property, and to a reasonable compensation for
its use, created by the common law cannot be taken away
without due process; but the law itself, as a rule of conduct,
may, unless
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constitutional limitations forbid, be changed at the will of the
legislature. The great office of statutes is to remedy defects
in the common law as they are developed, and to adapt it to
the changes of time and circumstances.
6. The limitation by legislative enactment of the rate of
charge for services
Page 94 U. S. 114
rendered in a public employment, or for the use of property
in which the public has an interest, establishes no new
principle in the law, but only gives a new effect to an old one.
7. Where warehouses are situated and their business is
carried on exclusively within a State, she may, as a matter of
domestic concern, prescribe regulations for them
notwithstanding they are used as instruments by those
engaged in interstate, as well as in-State, commerce, and,
until Congress acts in reference to their interstate relations,
such regulations can be enforced even though they may
indirectly operate upon commerce beyond her immediate
jurisdiction.
8. The court does not hold that a case may not arise in which
it may be found that a State has, under the form of regulating
her own affairs, encroached upon the exclusive domain of
Congress in respect to interstate commerce.
9. The ninth section of the first article of the Constitution of
the United States operates only as a limitation of the powers
of Congress, and in no respect affects the States in the
regulation of their domestic affairs.
10. The act of the general assembly of Illinois, entitled "An
Act to regulate public warehouses and the warehousing and
inspection of grain, and to give effect to art. 13 of the
Constitution of this State" approved April 25, 1871, is not
repugnant to the Constitution of the United States.
The Constitution of Illinois, adopted in 1870, contains the
following in reference to the inspection of grain, and the
storage thereof in public warehouses:
Luzon Stevedoring vs. Public Service Commission (digest)
Luzon Stevedoring Co. Inc. and Visayan Stevedore Transportation Co. vs. Public Service
Commission
93 Phil. 735 | Tuason, J.
Facts: Petitioners are engaged in the stevedoring or lighterage and harbor towage business.
They are also engaged in interisland service which consist of hauling cargoes such as sugar, oil,
fertilizer and other commercial commodities. There is no fixed route in the transportation of these
cargoes, the same being left at the indication of the owner or shipper of the goods. Petitioners, in
their hauling business, serve only a limited portion of the public.
The Philippine Shipowners Association complained to the Public Service Commission that
petitioners were engaged in the transportation of cargo in the Philippines for hire or compensation
without authority or approval of the Commission. The rates petitioners charged resulted in ruinous
competition.
The Public Service Commission restrained petitioners from further operating their watercraft to
transport goods for hire or compensation between points in the Philippines until the commission
approves the rates they propose to charge.
Issue: Whether the petitioners fall under the definition in Section 13 (b) of the Public Service Law
(C.A. Act No. 146)?
Held: Yes. It is not necessary under said definition that one holds himself out as serving or willing
to serve the public in order to be considered public service. It is not necessary, in order to be a
public service, that an organization be dedicated to public use, i.e., ready and willing to serve the
public as a class. It is only necessary that it must in some way be impressed with a public
interest; and whether the operation of a business is a public utility depends upon whether or not
the service rendered by it is of a public character and of public consequence and concern.
It can scarcely be denied that the contracts between the owners of the barges and the owners of
the cargo at bar were ordinary contracts of transportation and not of lease. Petitioners watercraft
was manned entirely by crews in their employ and payroll, and the operation of the said craft was
under their direction and control, the customers assuming no responsibility for the goods handled
on the barges.
C.A. No. 146 clearly declares that an enterprise of any of the kinds therein enumerated is a public
service if conducted for hire or compensation even if the operator deals only with a portion of the
public or limited clientele. Public utility, even where the term is not defined by statute, is not
determined by the number of people actually served.
The Public Service Law was enacted not only to protect the public against unreasonable charges
and poor, inefficient service, but also to prevent ruinous competition.
Just as the legislature may not declare a company or enterprise to be a public utility when it is not
inherently such, a public utility may not evade control and supervision of its operation by the
government by selecting its customers under the guise of private transactions.
Doctrine: An enterprise of any of the kinds enumerated in the Public Service Law is a public service if
conducted for hire or compensation even if the operator deals only with a portion of the public or with
limited clientele.
